


Hope of Morty

by rosewitchx



Category: Rick and Morty
Genre: Betrayal, Canon Divergence, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Cryofreeze (Marvel), Double Agents, False Identity, Gen, Identity Swap, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Torture, Kidnapping, Murder, S3 spoilers, Simulation, Tags might change, i like references, the rickchurian mortydate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-03
Updated: 2017-10-12
Packaged: 2019-01-08 10:54:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 991
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12252900
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosewitchx/pseuds/rosewitchx
Summary: Sometimes, things don’t go the way we want them to go.Sometimes, the universe reminds us: we are not gods.Alternate scenarios to the Rickchurian Mortydate.





	1. 01 : beth-rayal

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BADEND_01: betrayal  
> \- Make Beth and Jerry divorce on 3x1_TheRickshankRedemption  
> \- Make Robot Family on 3x2_RickmancingTheStone  
> \- Ditch therapy during 3x3_Pickle Rick  
> \- Get drunk during 3x4_Vindicators3TheReturnOfWorldEnder  
> \- Kill Jerry during 3x5_TheWhirlyDirlyConspiracy  
> \- Retoxify Morty during 3x6_RestAndRicklaxation  
> \- Visit the Citadel on 3x7_TheRicklantisMixup  
> \- Obtain a Scenario 4 on 3x8_MortysMindBlowers  
> \- Clone Beth on 3x9_TheABCsOfBeth  
> \- Fight the President

"Hey Rick, don't be mad, but I stole your portal gun."

The voice mail sucks. Of course it _fucking_ does, fucking _**Morty**_ sent it. Rick slumps on the grass, not certain of what exactly he's supposed to be feeling right now.

"I told you I didn't want that stupid selfie anymore. I just- I'm gonna head home, see you there." It ends there. He plays it again. It ends again.

"Ugh." Rick scratches his head. _Seriously_? He does all this shit for Morty, and the tiny motherfucker ditches him? He's gonna pay when he gets home. He wipes the smeared blood from the President's sucker punch off of his face and sighs. "I gotta go."

"That means I win," the President states, and Rick seriously considers shooting at him through one of the 'invisible' dudes. "You can't leave. You're a terrorist, you—"

"Yeah, sure. Whatever. Look, if you let me use your— what the fuck, your portal, and forget about me at all, I'll go home and forget about you. As _thanks_ , you know."

The sarcasm does not go unnoticed by the President, but he chooses to ignore it. "Okay."

—

Rick arrives home and Morty's not there.

"Little shit. Beth?"

She's watching tv, apparently having forgotten that sentience crisis from before. The perks of being a clone. Rick sure wishes that kinda shit worked on him.

(He's tried before. No clone can handle his genius.)

"Yeah?" Her voice is too sweet, too not-Beth, but he ignores the uncanny-valley levels of weird and leans against the wall.

"Where's Morty?"

"I don't know. He hasn't been home all day."

 _Weird_.

But Rick lets it slide; he's probably dicking around with the portal gun.

Until it's a week and he still hasn't returned home.

But it's too late; the portal gun's gone forever, and so is his laptop, his games, the few books he had. The journal Rick knew he kept under his mattress is gone too. Some mindblowers are not there anymore.

It should have been obvious.

—

Somewhere out there, a Morty jumps out of a portal.

A Morty receives him with a smile.

**“Welcome back.”**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> is it just me or did morty seem kinda fishy during the season finale  
> actually... all of themseemed fishy
> 
> /we never left the shoneys/


	2. 02 : gone mortying

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> BADEND_02: gone missing  
> \- Make Beth and Jerry divorce on 3x1_TheRickshankRedemption  
> \- Make Robot Family on 3x2_RickmancingTheStone  
> \- Attend therapy during 3x3_Pickle Rick  
> \- Get drunk during 3x4_Vindicators3TheReturnOfWorldEnder  
> \- Spare Jerry during 3x5_TheWhirlyDirlyConspiracy  
> \- Retoxify Morty during 3x6_RestAndRicklaxation  
> \- Visit the Citadel on 3x7_TheRicklantisMixup  
> \- Obtain a Scenario 4 on 3x8_MortysMindBlowers  
> \- Clone Beth on 3x9_TheABCsOfBeth  
> \- Fight the President

Maybe Rick didn’t notice this, but the second he looked away from Morty, he vanished from sight.

It _should_ have been obvious, he realizes. But it hadn’t been.

Morty never comes home, even when Rick waits for him. His room remains still, empty, as if he’s just left for school and simply hasn’t returned yet.

A week passes. He begins looking for him, across space, across the multiverse. He roams the streets of Mortytown, asks questions, _anything_ that might lead him to his kid: nothing comes his way.

Another week passes. Rick keeps looking.

He debates getting a new Morty. Bailing on this reality, forgetting the pain.

He can’t bring himself to leave, still, even when Beth doesn’t seem to care that her little kid has vanished, even when Summer doesn’t stay in anymore. There’s literally _nothing_ for him there anymore. He doesn’t have to stay for breakfast, he doesn’t have to ask Summer for help and ignore the pang of sorrow that hits him every time. But he does anyway.

He keeps looking.

—

Deep in the Citadel, a Morty sleeps.

He’s encased in ice, his head buried in dreamland. Another Morty looks at him from outside his chilly prison, allowing himself to smile. A reference comes to head, and he has to bite his tongue from saying ‘hail hydra’.

He caresses the ice block as if it was still awake, and whispers:

**_“Welcome home.”_ **

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the other thing i thought. morty just literally vanished while rick was arguing in the oval office? like watch the episode. one frame he’s at the couch and the next he’s gone. *x-files theme plays*


	3. 03: rickmulation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> BADEND_03: simulation  
> \- Make Beth and Jerry divorce on 3x1_TheRickshankRedemption  
> \- Make Robot Family on 3x2_RickmancingTheStone  
> \- Attend therapy during 3x3_Pickle Rick  
> \- Get drunk during 3x4_Vindicators3TheReturnOfWorldEnder  
> \- Spare Jerry during 3x5_TheWhirlyDirlyConspiracy  
> \- Retoxify Morty during 3x6_RestAndRicklaxation  
> \- Go on an adventure to Atlantis on 3x7_TheRicklantisMixup  
> \- Obtain a Scenario 4 on 3x8_MortysMindBlowers  
> \- Clone Beth on 3x9_TheABCsOfBeth  
> \- Fight the President

Rick feels it: there's something wrong.

Since when does Beth break the fourth wall? Why is Morty acting so— so strange? What is Jerry even doing here, when he shouldn't—

Everything is all wrong, all messed up— he feels it, but something just  _won't_  let him think about it, and— he knows what it is, he knows  ** _everything_** , but—

—

The Morty watches in silence as his nemesis' memories play before him. It's taken a lot of killing to even get to them, and he's been forced to make some  _promises_ in exchange, but he hopes it'll have been worth it.

The Rickest Rick had fallen. Fallen to the most advanced brain scanner the Federation had — within it, life continued as normal. Without the Citadel, without the Federation. Just Rick and Morty, forever and ever, one hundred years.

The Morty feels sick.

He shuts down the video feed and glances at Rick. The man, still connected, shudders. Maybe the power outage from before has something to do with it. Still, he just couldn't allow his secrets to fall to the Federation just because Rick had been too self-centered to realize it was all a lie. Comeuppance, he thinks, if after all that happened, Rick ends up with brain damage.

But it's not like he cares.

**It's not like he's the version of himself that does.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *we never left the shoneys intensifies*  
> i'm debating on whether to post the last one or leave it as it is right now. i feel it's not as good as the other three. please tell me what you think!


	4. 04: mortyplaced

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> BADEND_04: replaced
> 
> RANDOMLY-OBTAINED ENDING

When you know nothing matters, the universe is yours.

Despite what any Rick might think, Mortys know this as well. They aren't stupid: once they see the first death, the first body that accompanies every Rick's and every Morty's lives, this much becomes clear. Nothing matters, so you're set free. Nothing matters.

So he doesn't understand: why this Rick  _cares_  so much.

He drinks, but not over missing condiments and abandonment issues; he drinks over dead families and irrational attachments. He insults him, but there's a glimpse of care and love behind each rough insult.

Strange. Illogical.

Morty can't understand. No formula or theorem can answer why this Rick is like that. An anomaly, but that's what makes him so powerful: the Rickest Rick.

If he knew— what he's done to his original Morty—

Why is he getting so worked up about this? He doesn't care. He can't care.

He reminds himself as he lays in bed one night: if there's one truth in the universe...

**...is that Ricks, despite what it might seem, don't care about Mortys.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> turns out i did like how it turned out.  
> now im gonna go focus on midterm exams before i die.


End file.
